


Imagine Dragons

by sunflower123



Category: SKAM (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Angst, F/F, F/M, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2018-02-11
Packaged: 2019-02-24 14:43:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13215987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunflower123/pseuds/sunflower123
Summary: Yousef Acar is the youngest member of the royal family of Elladiratis. It is summer and he is thinking of quiting his job as a teacher. There is a ball that his family is giving in order to find his brother a wife. some things go wrong and he is sent on a quest. On this quest he finds things that were once lost, uncovers the truth about the mysterious creatures that live in the land and finds out that what he was looking for was right in front of him all along.





	1. The beginning

**Author's Note:**

> The kingdoms in this story are losly inspired by the early ottoman empire, i think around the year 1600. I am almost certain that i have made some mistakes as these are islamic countries and i am not muslim so i took all my information from the internet as best as i could. if there are any mayor mistakes i have made or if there is anything that I forgot please tell me, I'll change it immediatly. The story is told from a first person perspective but the person it is being told from changes sometimes.

The path I was walking was rocky and steep. My steps were slow and calculated as I avoided lose stones as best as I could. The longer I walked the more dust I collected on my sandals and my toes. I kept my eyes to the ground to pay attention to where I stepped. There were a few turns in my path where the ground was flatter and I didn't have to concentrate so hard on my feet. Every once in a while I looked up to the horizon and downhill to my destination. The sun glared into my eyes every time I looked up and I could barely separate the dry stones from the earth. As I walked down gravity kept pulling my down, tempting me to run.  
There was one time when I had run down this mountain. I had refused to listen to my parents warnings and just let myself go. It had gone well for a while until I tripped and fell. I had cried until my father had held me and comforted me. That was the last thing I remembered of him. The day after he had gone traveling and had promised to be back within two weeks. But he never came. I had had a happy childhood though. Perhaps one of the best a child could have wished for. But it had been stopped abruptly when my father had disappeared when I was seven. The kingdom had been without a ruler then and my mother had had to take over. First I had been angry with my father. I had wanted to find him and yell at him for leaving his family and kingdom behind. Nadim, my little brother had been just a baby at that time. But the anger that I had felt towards my father had soon been replaced by the worry and fear that something might have happened to him. I had cursed myself for ever being angry with him. The good part to this was that me and my siblings had grown closer to our mother, sharing in her grief and worry and supporting her with the responsibility she now had.

My legs were still walking in a controlled steady rhythm on the rocky ground. The heat on my skin got worse the further I got. The rays of sunlight pierced my skin like knives. My descent was unpleasant to say the least. I had also been sweating too much, causing my feet to slip in my sandals and cut my toes on the rocks. Soon my vision became blurry and my mouth became dry. I reached the last steep hill and paused to rest for a moment. I took my bottle of water from my belt and took a swig. When my heart had calmed down, my vision was clear and I had swept the sweat from my for head I started my last descend. Here were even more lose rocks and more often than not I nearly tripped. I chose my path carefully, sidestepping rocks where I could. My toes were hurting badly now and probably bleeding. But I had to keep on walking. The path ended at the foot of the mountain in gravel and the gravel slowly went over into grass.

The grass was dry and filled with weeds. They scratched my hurting feet but I couldn't turn back. Though dry and painful the flat land and the sight of the castle on the other side of the lake gave me a feeling of contentment. A few weeks ago I would have taken my time to roll out my prayer mat here. It was so peaceful and quiet, the only sounds coming from the nature around me. But after the things that had happened all those weeks ago I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t pray to someone I didn’t believe in anymore. I stood still for a moment in the shade of a tree leaning against the wood.

I admired the castle from a far. The building was tall and wide and spread across a big part of the shore line on the other side of the lake. The lake had always divided our two countries was now sparkling in the sun. It was as if it was telling me to cross it, promising treasures beyond my imagination. The way the castle was placed on the shore made it look like it was floating. I had never crossed the lake, it was forbidden when I was younger and now I had no desire to go there. I had always loved the castle though, loved the architecture. But apparently the royalty there had treated their people like animals in the past. I didn't know if those rumors were true. But now a new family had taken the throne but I had heard nothing about them yet. I pushed myself off the tree and continued my walk. I crossed the grassland and went into the forest. It was far less hot here than in the open field as it provided more shade. If I looked back I would still see the castle, sparkling in the sun with pride. The light made small spots on the ground creating a golden hue. Mysterious creatures were rumoured to roam in these woods at night. Some people reported to have seen them, or even talked to them. There were stories of fairies, werewolves, witches, dragons and even mermaids that supposedly lived in the lake. When I was little I would actively look for them. There were always mysterious things happening, but nothing that could prove the existence of these creatures. After about half a mile I ended up at a small river.

Up until I was about ten my friends and I would swim and try to catch fishes here. The river came from a small lake that was more like a pond somewhere higher up the mountain. The river was about one meter deep and let into the lake. There was an old wooden bridge and as I crossed it I let my fingers glide over the rough railing. The bridge creaked under my feet. The cuts in my toes were stinging and my feet felt so hot they felt like they were suffocating. Once I was on the other side of the river I stepped to the left off the path. I turned to the river and stepped into the water. The icy cold water was relieving and soothed the cuts in my toes. The cuts didn't feel too deep so I didn't bother looking at them closely. I wiggled my toes one last time and stepped back onto the riverbank. I looked to my right, about thirty meters away was the delta of the river into the lake. Somewhere on the horizon I spotted something. I narrowed my eyes trying to determine what it was. It looked like perhaps a small boat coming my way. I dismissed the thought, no one would come to the river by boat as it was a dead end and way to undeep. They were probably going to the docks in the town I was going to, Atla. I took my attention off the boat as it was unimportant and resumed my way through the woods.

My sandals were soggy but it didn't bother me, at least my feet weren't cooking anymore. The town I was going to was quite big and had a large population as it was the main point of trade and the easiest way to get into the country. As prince I was of course familiar with most places in our land. But this one I knew the best. First of all, we would receive other royals and important people there and would stay in the city castle with our guests. Second, this was the place where I had taken up a teaching position. As one of the youngest members of the royal family after a brother and two sisters, who took up most of the tasks concerning the land, there wasn't much left and expected for me to do apart from studying and marrying. Although the last part was expected of all my siblings.

An old mentor of mine, who had also been teaching the kids at a Sibyan school in Atla, had had to go traveling a few years ago and had asked me to take his place for a few months until he was back. At first I had been hesitant about it, but it was better than doing nothing for most of the week and I had had the right education for it. When he came back I had grown to love the profession and decided to stay and teach the smaller children. They were about 3, 4 and 5 years old and all in their first year. But I wasn't going to the city to teach. I had been called upon by the house keeper of the city castle to go over the guest list. Tomorrow there was going to be a ball with the purpose of finding my brother a wife. I had been in charge of the guest list. I had taken this opportunity to invite our new neighbors across the lake. They had answered that they would most certainly come, which was a relief.

I walked through the grand wooden gates of Atla and was immediately met with the buzz of everyday life. There were people walking in groups and alone. There were horses, carriages and people with other farm animals. The rich and the poor walked among each other in haste. I was wearing somewhat regular clothes, so anyone who didn't know me personally did not recognize me. I was walking amongst the people through the narrow streets when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned around and in front of me stood Even. We had known each other since we were about four and we had been great friends ever since. He had supported me with the loss of my father and my brother and I had supported him in his personal crisis’s in his teenage years. The consequences of those crisis’s still loomed over us some times. For example when he attempted suicide, which was one of the things that had made me lose my religion. You would think that impossible to happen to someone who teaches little children the basics of Islam most of the year in the middle of a mosque, but it did. I missed it though and hoped to get it back one day. Only I had no idea how to start. Because of this I had decided to resign from teaching as soon as the new school year started.

Even was the son of a painter. The same painter who had painted my father’s picture when he was about twenty. They had quickly become friends, this was mainly how I knew him. He was also part of a noble family, the Naesheims, they were from the northern countries and had long ago immigrated here.

"Yousef, what are you doing here?"

"Emil asked me to go over the guest list for tomorrow one more time."

 "Ah, the ball. Are you ready to not be in the spotlight for once." He ginned.

 "I am never in the spotlight."

 "Says you. I hear everyone talk." he teased.

 "They talk more about my brother than me. You just can't admit that because you had a crush on my brother last year and were rejected. Saying people, you, pay attention to him would mean that you aren't over him. So now of all times you have to emphasize that." I said smirking.

 "That is not true. Everyone knows I am over him."

 "But do you?" I narrowed my eyes at him.

 "Yes, I do. Now stop." he laughed and I laughed with him.

 "How is your father doing?" I asked.

 "Fine, I just need to get some paint from the market."

 "Ah, what is he painting?"

 "The portrait of Baron Martez on his death bed."

 "This struck me. The Martezes were invited to dine with us tomorrow before the ball, this would probably change that. "Baron Martez is dead?"

 "Yes, news came just in. They are holding the funeral this afternoon."

 "Do you know if they are still coming tomorrow?"

 "They probably are, but just for the ball. The youngest daughters have to be introduced into society. But they are not staying for dinner."

 "Ah, okay. Thank you for telling me, I’ll tell the house keeper."

 

We said our goodbyes and I resumed my way to the city castle.

I knocked on the grand wooden door of the city castle. A servant named Alisha opened and immediately recognized me.  
"Ah master, we were expecting you"

She opened the door wider and I stepped from the pavement onto the white marmer floor.  
"The housekeeper is in the dining room sir"

I smiled " Thank you Alisha."

She curtsied and left. I made my way further into the great hall. In front of me were the steps that led upstairs. On my left were tall heavy wooden doors leading to the ball room. On my right was the door to the dining room. I went inside and the housekeeper, his name was Emil, was talking to a butler. I was happy to see him again.

"Emil, you had asked for me to come."

He turned around and smiled. " Yes, I wanted to go over the guest lists for tomorrow. If you would follow me to the drawing room."

I nodded and followed him to the drawing room that was connected to the dining room. He walked towards the table in the middle of the room. On the table was a book with no doubt the guest lists. I stood next to him as he opened it somewhere in the middle.  
"I would like you to confirm a few things. First the list for the ball itself, there will be three hundred people attending all of about fifty families in total, is that correct."

 " Yes, that is right. No one has declined the invitation so far." And I inspected the list searching for any missing people.

 " Very well. And no one has cancelled for dinner either?" I wanted to answer negatively but then remembered my conversation with Even. " Uhm yes, the Martez family is most likely not coming, the baron died this morning. They will probably still be recovering from the loss."

 "ah okay. " he crossed the name of the list.

 This left six families attending dinner with us. The Meakers, the Bakkoushes, the Naesheims, the Saetres, the Boukhals and the Mohns. The Bakkoushes were the family that were now on the throne of the kingdom on the other side of the lake and also owned the castle I had admired so much. We had invited them purely to see what kind of people they were and if we could mend the relationship between the two counties. We had also invited them to stay with us overnight.

"And overnight, no other families apart from the Bakkoushes will be staying?"

"No, only them."

"Very well, have you collected all the information concerning allergies. So we can keep that in mind with the food."

" Yes, no one has any mayor allergies, but Baroness Mohn is pregnant so be sure to keep the raw meats away from her."

"Thank you sir, I’ll be sure to pass it on to the cooks."

"Of course Emil, anything else?"

"No that should be all sir."

"Have a good day Emil."

"You too sir."

  
With that I left the drawing room. My feet were still hurting, so I decided to put on some socks and more practical shoes. I walked up the carpeted steps two stairs to the second floor. On the first floor were the guest bedrooms. I went to the right into the hallway and opened the second door on the left into my bedroom. My room was pretty big with a balcony attached to it. When I was little I used to let messages down to my friends who were sleeping over on the first floor. There was a king-sized bed and lavish carpeting. I had my own bathroom and all other things you'd expect a prince to have.  
I walked to the bathroom and sat on the chair next to the bathtub. I pulled of my sandals and inspected the cuts. They were mostly on the front of my toes and some scratches were on the sides of my feet. I washed them with lukewarm water in the sink. It was good that I was so lean. When I deemed them clean enough I used all the acrobatic skill I had to get a towel from the bathtub side while keeping one foot in the sink and the other on the bath mat. I hopped back onto the chair and padded my feet dry. Then I stretched to grab a strip of binding and a bandage I had in the cupboard under the sink. I put the bandages on my biggest cuts and ripped the strip of binding in two. I wound the bindings around my feet. I tried standing up and slowly distributing my weight to my feet. It didn’t hurt too much and I walked carefully out of the bathroom to the bedroom closet. There I got a pair of socks and some more comfortable shoes from under the bed. I sat down on my covers and put my socks and shoes on. My feet felt far more secure now and when I stood up they didn't really hurt as much anymore. I left my room and closed the door behind me. I made my way downstairs and said goodbye to Emil.  
Once outside in the courtyard I looked up at the sun and saw that it had to be around four o'clock. It was enough to get home some hours before dark. I had just exited the castle gates and was walking past the florists when i heard a small voice calling my name.

"Teacher Yousef! Teacher Yousef!" I turned around and smiled as I saw a little girl running up to me with one arm stretched out. It was Dalia, she was five and I taught her at school. She was holding something between her pointer finger and thumb.

"Teacher Yousef look! Look!" I crouched down on the side of the street to see what she was holding. "What is it Dalia?" She showed me what she was holding. It was a small tooth. "Wow!" I gasped. "Do you have to put it back now?"

"No teacher Yousef. Its gonna grow back!" she giggled

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. Look here." She smiled widely and I could see an open space where her left front tooth was supposed to be. I could already see the start of the new tooth growing.

"Wow Dalia. You're all grown up now!" "Yes!" She said enthusiastically.

Dalia was the daughter of the florists that arranged the flowers for most of our events.

"Did you help your mother with the flowers for tomorrow?" I asked.

"Yes. You can come inside, than I can show them."

I laughed and went with her inside the shop. She walked in like it was her own. And in a way it was, she lived here. Behind the counter was her father Ali.

"Your majesty, what brings you here?" He said once he saw me entre.

"Yousef is fine, we have known each other for quite a while. Dalia wanted to show me the flower arrangements for tomorrow." I replied smiling.

He looked at his daughter smiled warmly "Well you know where it is. But don't touch anything alright."

"Okay baba. Oh and can you save my tooth." She handed him the tooth and then looked from her father back to me smiling. "Come on."

I followed her through the door behind father to the back of the store. On a table were samples with flowers that were going to be used tomorrow. Tomorrow there would be fresh flowers brought in. The flower arrangements was one of the things that my older sister Maya was in charge of. There were colors as red, blue, purple, white and pink and instead of reminding me of bruises they represented my brothers personality perfectly. He was a warm person with a lot of passion for the kingdom.

" Look there are red tulips and pink roses and blue bells."

"Do you remember the Arabic word for rose I told you before the summer ?"

She scrunched her face up in thought. "Uhm... airt...te...fea?" She replied.

"Yes very good.”

I decided to change the subject “Your birthday is in two weeks right? Have you already chosen your flowers for that?"

"Yes, I want sunflowers and daisies."

"Sunflowers and daisies? Only yellow and white?"

"No I also want roses"

"What color?"

"All of them!"

I grinned. “And who are you inviting to your party?"

" My family and my parents are going to invite some of their friends too. From school I am inviting Isabella off course and Leila, Sarah, Karim, Arthur, William and Gwen. Oh and you!"

"I can come too?" it was not the first time I had been invited to a children’s parties. But this was Dalia and my parents had known her family for years, so we would probably all go.

"Yes, and teacher Amir of course" she said smiling up at me.

"Thank you."

The bell in front of the shop rang. Dalia went to go look and a moment later she came back with Leila, one of her best friends.

"Hey Leila. It is nice to see you."

"Hello teacher Yousef. What are you doing here?" Leila asked.

"I was showing him the flowers for the ball." Dalia replied enthusiastically.

Laila’s eyes lit up " Can I see them too?"

"Yes of course, look here." We then all looked at the flowers again and talked about our favorites. Leila’s favorite was the daffodil. I just said I liked all of them and Dalia's was roses.

"Do you want to play a game with us?" Asked Dalia after a while.

“No, I think it is time for me to go home. I have to be there before dark."

"Okay" they both said.

  
I said my goodbyes to the children and Ali and started my way back home. It was getting late and if I was quick I would make it back to the castle by night fall. About half way on my path through the forest the sky already started changing into beautiful pinks and oranges. It was getting slightly colder but it was still pleasant. My feet were really starting to hurt now, but I had to push through. The shadows of the trees were longer and made the atmosphere quite chilling.  
As I came near the old wooden bridge I heard noises. I found this strange since normally no one walked this path at this time in the evening. I slowly walked closer and heard two people argue. I didn't want to disturb and hid behind a bush. There was a boy and a girl walking each on a side of the river. They were looking at the plants and other organisms seemingly examining and cataloging them. The girl was on my side of the river and she slowly made her way towards my hiding place. They were about my age, perhaps a little younger. Now I discovered that they were not arguing as I had previously thought. They were discussing the various plants and bugs, referring to them in a language I didn't know, yelling at each other across the river. I tried to see if I knew them. I went a little to the right to catch the face of the blonde man in the other side. He mumbled something. "Hey, when you have your back turned to me I can't actually hear you" the girl replied. When he turned around to say something to the girl I did not recognize him. After exchanging some words with him she walked closer to my hiding place. When I could see her more clearly my breath caught in my throat. The pain in my feet and the approaching night sky were forgotten. She was beautiful and smiled with a smile that could end wars, or start them. Even from a distance I could see her eyes sparkling and crinkling in a most adorable fashion as she laughed. I crouched more behind the bush so she would not see me.  
The bush I was behind was rather poisonous especially in the flowers. She looked in my direction and her eyes widened in recognition. I thought she had seen me and took a deep breath, ready to face her when she started yelling at me for spying behind a bush. Apparently she hadn’t seen me. Instead she walked to the bush and reached for one of the flowers. I shot up in panic and grabbed her hand.

"Don't. They're poisonous."

She froze and looked at me. "I am sorry" I stuttered and let go of her hand when I noticed that I was holding it.

She frowned as she lowered her hand to her side. "Who are you?"


	2. Who are you?

"Who are you?"

"My name is Yousef. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you." I said nervously.

"You didn't scare me. I was just surprised." She said still frowning. "And the chance of these flowers being poisonous is very slim. The poison has been almost entirety bred out everywhere"

I had no idea that that was a thing that happened. But I wanted to reply something witty to her witty comment. So I looked around me and noticed that the bushes of these flowers were growing rather randomly around the place and I couldn't remember any ever being planted here with the purpose of breeding.

"Not here, these have grown here naturally and no one has ever interfered with that."

"Sana, who are you talking to?" The blond man yelled from across the river.

She turned her head towards him and answered "Someone named Yousef. He was spying on us."

"I wasn't spying on you" I clearly had been but I didn't wanna seem creepy.

She turned back towards me. "Then what are you doing hiding behind a bush? Plucking berries?" She replied narrowing her eyes.

"No" I came out from behind the bush onto the riverbank and decided to just tell the truth. "I was just observing. Almost no one walks this path and most certainly not at this time in the evening. I wanted to know what you were doing. But I apologize. It was inappropriate I hope you can forgive me. " I rambled and a little amused she raised her eyebrows again.

"You could have just asked us."

"You would have probably told me to mind my own business."

She frowned " You don't know that and if you really want to know, we are cataloging the plants and animals." She said, gesturing around her with her quill.

It seemed she wasn't bothered anymore by my spying behind the bush. This made me less nervous. "I thought something like that." I said smirking.

The blond man had crossed the bridge stood now next to her and introduced himself cheerfully. He had an accent and was probably new here and just set on making as many friends as possible. "I am Isak, nice to meet you."

"Yousef" I responded. "Why are you cataloging everything, if you don't mind me asking?"

"We are studying biology, we had to make an inventory of off organisms around this lake as an assignment." Answered Sana.

"Yeah, we're biology partners." Either they were together or they were just study partners. I was hoping on the later but I was still a little panicked.

"Not in that way! I don't like him." Sana said quickly, noticing my expression.

I was relieved by this but I tried not to show it. They did act more like siblings than anything else. A surge of stinging pain came up in my leg from my feet. I winced and sat on the grass facing the river.

"Are you okay?" Sana said, crouching in front of me.

"I think so." I replied as I pulled both my shoes off. There was some blood on my socks. I undid them as well. It was quite painful as some blood had dried up and stuck both to my feet and the fabric of my socks. The binding around my feet been entirely run through with blood.

"That doesn't look so good. If you want I can look at it?"

"If you want to." I looked at her and tried to smile but it came out more as a grimace. I stretched my leg out and she started carefully unwrapping the binding on my foot. It was sticky and wet with blood as my wounds had opened again.

"I am going to finish the inventory while you do this. Then we can go back to Atla, it's getting late." Said Isak who had been watching the entire time. He walked away and took Sana's papers and quill she had put next to her on the ground with him.

"Yes, of course." She answered. "Did you do this by yourself?" She said facing me again.

"Yes."

"Did you clean the wounds before you put this on?"

"Yes, I did, but just with water."

She turned towards Isak who was back om the other side of the river. "Isak, can you bring my bag from the boat." She yelled.

Isak got the bag from the boat that was about twenty meters from where he had stood. He crossed the bridge and gave it to Sana, then went back and proceeded the cataloging. Out of her bag she got a cotton ball and a small bottle.

"What is that?" I asked.

"Alcohol, helps disinfecting wounds." She put some on the cotton and looked at me.

"You are gonna have to stay still, this is gonna sting." it indeed stung a lot and I jerked my feet away while wincing.

"Relax, it's almost over." She held my ankles to keep my feet in place and applied the alcohol on the cuts on my feet. When she was done she got a different kind of cotton and some binding and wrapped both my feet.

"See, all done." Sana said proudly as she surveyed her work. It was very neatly done. It was really getting late now and I probably wouldn't get to the mountain before dark.

"Hey, may I ask something?" I asked as I carefully put my socks and shoes back on.

"Yes, what is it?" She asked while grabbing her bag and standing up.

"Would I be able to travel with you back to Atla? I have to get to the castle up the mountain, but the path going to it from here is too dangerous in the dark. I can take the main road from Atla, its much safer."

She was a little hesitant, which was understandable. "Uhm, yes. But I do want to know your full name then. I want to know if I can trust you." I never told her my full name. I hadn't planned to since I hadn't planned to talk to them in the first place.

"My name is Yousef Acar." I took the family seal from the inside pocket of my jacket and showed it to her.

She studied it for a moment and smiled. "Okay, I believe you."

We then went to Isak on the other side of the river. As we all walked to the boat Sana explained to Isak why I was coming with them. As she was talking to Isak is saw some bushes with bluebells on the side. Bluebells were the only flowers near the river that were not poisonous. I ducked down and plucked a few, unnoticed. I then put them in my jacket pocket. We arrived at the small boat and stepped into it. Sana sat in front Isak and I sat on the sides. It was cooling off quickly now and I shivered.

"There are blankets under your seat." Said Isak. I got them out and handed one to Sana, one to Isak and wrapped one around myself.

I offered to take one of the two paddles that were there. Isak took the other one. I picked up the other paddle and Isak pushed off shore. When we were on i took the opportunity to look back at the castle on the shore line.

"Do you like it?" Sana asked smiling at me. She almost glowed in the moonlight, it took me a second to answer. "Yes, I love it. It's beautiful."

She hummed "You should see it from the inside. It's even better."

No one I knew had ever been inside of the castle. "You've been there?" I asked.

She nodded in response "Is it true that the last king was cruel?" I couldn't help but asking.

She narrowed her eyes but smiled. "Uh yes I think so? He was rumored to be controlled by a goblin " She laughed. "but I don't know of that was true."

"Well I hope the new one is a lot better." I said once more looking at the castle.

"Me too." She answered with a sigh.

Isak started coughing but before I could react to it Sana started speaking again.

"I am sorry about what happened to your brother." She said and I felt myself coming back to reality. I was taken right out of the dreamlike atmosphere that the lantern on the boat, the moon, the night sky and the water had created.

"Thank you. It is hard. But I think we will recover."

"Obviously I can't really understand how it feels, as I have never experienced anything like that. But I have two brothers and I couldn't bare losing any of them, especially in the way you did." She paused. "I think you are very brave in the way you are standing in it. And you are clearly recovering very quickly, I admire that very much." My pathetic, easily having crushes, self actually blushed at this. This is when I knew I had to take a step back.

I was flattered by this comment off course, but it was far from justified. I wasn't recovering at all. I was walking around with a smile on my face, acting as if nothing was wrong. But on the inside I felt the pain getting worse every day and I didn't think I was going to heal any time soon. I was still paddling the water away. But instead of looking at her I was looking at the water in deep thought.

"Are you okay?" Sana said and I looked back at her. She was had a concerned look on her face.

"Yes, I am fine" I took a deep breath "I prefer not to talk about it too much. It's still fresh."

She smiled in understanding and looked away. I looked to the forest. I could barely see anything as the moonlight wasn't very strong and the light from our lantern only brightened a little part of our surroundings. There was a comfortable silence as I looked at the trees. Seeing if I could perhaps see some animals that lived freely at night. I did see something move at some point on the shore. It looked like a rabbit. It looked at me and was gone before I could fully register it. After a while we finally made to the docks. From the docks we walked to the place where Sana presumably lived. There were stables right next to it. Sana took lead and walked right into them. She walked directly to a silver colored mare, gave her a sugar cube and turned towards me while stroking her nose.

"This is Saree' you can borrow her for now." "thank you" I replied. She walked over to the wall of the stables and grabbed a bridle of the hook. She walked back to Saree' and put it on her head. While she was preparing the horse Isak started a conversation with me.

"So, what exactly do you do as prince."

"Not much actually. Since I am the youngest of my siblings I don't have a lot to do."

"So, what do you do then?" Asked Isak.

"I teach, Sibyan school. The first years." Isak looked at me confused. Which was understandable, one wouldn't immediately think of a prince teaching Sibyan school. Before I could explain though Sana had already gotten Saree' out of the stables and had finished saddling her. She gestured me to follow and walked with the horse on its reigns out of the stables. Once we were outside she handed me the reigns.

"Here you go. Be careful with her though. She is my favorite."

I smiled. " I will. I will be back in town tomorrow, shall I bring back here then."

"There is no need, you can just leave her at the city castle. I am going to be there that evening anyway, so I'll pick her up then. I assume you have stables there?"

I was a bit surprised. Although I could have guessed it from the way she dressed. Now I really wanted to know who she was.

" Yes, we have stables. And if you are coming to the ball tomorrow may I at least know your full name?"

She squinted at me and smirked. " Well gatherings like that, where one basically has nothing to do but stand around, talking to people you have never met and will never meet again, tend to get rather boring. Certainly, for those who are not looking to marry you brother. I think that if I keep my identity a secret from you, until tomorrow when I show up at the castle, that that will be a great conversation starter. And with that we can skip the awkward bit at the beginning and the small talk. Also, I don't have a lot of friends that are coming. How does that sound?"

"As a conversation starter, I could always ask you to dance."

"That wouldn't be a conversation starter, that is just be a dance starter. We could be dancing but still have nothing interesting to say."

I doubted that. "I don't think that would happen. I think we are both interesting enough."

"Are you asking me to dance?" Sana said smiling.

I thought about it for a second. And why not. I could ask her at the ball surrounded by a lot of people, making me very nervous. Or I could just ask her now, like a promise. I was still very nervous, but now I didn't have a lot of people with a lot of expectations staring at me.

"Yes, I am." I stood up a little straighter "May I have the first dance" I asked reaching out my free hand, like one normally does when asking someone to dance. She looked at my hand for a moment then laid hers mine. I noticed that her hand was very soft and warm.

"Okay, I'll dance the first dance with you. If I don't get a better offer first." She teased at the end. She took her hand out of mine. Then I remembered the other reason she had said she didn't want to reveal her identity to me.

"And about not having friends here, my sisters will be there and they always make friends with everyone. So, I wouldn't worry about that." I said

" Thank you"

"Well tomorrow then, goodbye Sana." I said.

"Goodbye Yousef." She said smiling back at me. She then stroked the horses back one last time and whispered something in its ear. She smiled at me one last time, turned around and walked to the house.

 

At that moment I remembered the flowers in my pocket.

"Oh, Sana. I forgot something." I called after her.

She turned back around and walked towards me frowning. "What is it?" she asked. 

My hands were getting clammy as she approached me. I put my had in my pocket and got out the bluebells. Prior to calling her I had been very sure of my actions. Now not anymore. I smiled nervously looking at my hands

"Earlier this evening when you almost plucked that flower. Uhm... Well... The only flower in that area actually that is not poisonous is the bluebell." This had sounded so much better in my head. I closed my eyes in embarrassment but when I opened them and looked up she was looking at me smiling. I smiled back, finally having the courage to give her the flowers and not just abort mission. I handed them to her and she accepted them with a grin. "Thank you." Just before the silence got awkward we said good bye and I got on the horse. I started my way to the main road and then home.

 

Sana

 

I watched Yousef ride away on Saree' with a smile. It had been a peculiar afternoon. First we had arrived here. I had only seen the country from my bedroom windows. But it was nothing compared to the real thing. The town was so alive and full of excitement. Not that Iralla didn't have that, it did. But there was something special about seeing a city you had never been to, only heard of, for the first time.

Discovering Yousef Acar of all people in a forest, hiding behind a bush was certainly an interesting experience. The more I had gotten to know him in that brief period, the more I had liked his character. The fact that he had been spying was bad, but the way he talked and acted after that made him sort of endearing. But this was only my first impression on him. Tomorrow he could turn out to not be as nice as he had been today.

"Are you starring after your prince?" Teased Isak.

"No Isak, I am not." I glared at him. "And he is not my prince, I just met him."

"He asked you to dance. That certainly means something." He argued

I sighed. "It doesn't, he was just being polite."

Isak looked at me as if I was crazy. "Yeah, of course."

I rolled my eyes and ignored the comment. We walked back to the big apartment my family had rented for just the night. We had originally planned to come the day of the ball as any other person would. But a few days earlier mine and Isak's mentor had heard about us going here and given us an assignment that, according to him, would be perfect to execute in Elladiratis. This had been true, but it was something that would take up a whole day. This was why my parents had decided to come here earlier. Plus, it was also a good opportunity to see the city. We went inside the house and to our rooms. There I put down my bag on the floor in front of my bed. I crouched before the bag and searched with one hand, in the other holding the bluebells, inside for a pair of scissors. Once I had finally found them with I cut the stems of the flowers in a nice sharp point to make the water transport possible again as best as I could. Then I got a cup of water from the bath room and placed the bluebells in it. The cup I then placed on my night table. They would only survive for the night. Tomorrow I would press dry them in a book, so I could save them. I had thought it was a sweet gesture, it was kind of adorable the way he stuttered through the words. The invitation to dance was nice too. Although I wasn't sure if he had really meant that. I put my mind of the flowers and Yousef Acar and grabbed a book out of my suitcase. I went to the living room and sat on a couch. In the room was the rest of my family, plus Isak. He had come with us since we had had to do the assignment together. He was going to leave again tomorrow morning. I had been reading for a while when I was interrupted by Elias sitting on a chair opposite me.

"Who was that man I saw you talking to outside? And why was he taking Saree'?"

"I lent her to him, it was too dark to get home on foot safely." I answered lazily, not wanting to go deeper into it.

"But you insisted yesterday on taking Saree' with you so that you could ride out alone and see the nature and all that. And you still gave her away. How do you know it was safe? Who was he?" He replied.

I sighed " If you really wanna know who he was, it was Yousef Acar. "

Now I had the attention of the whole room. None of us had really met the Acar family yet.

"Are you sure it was him?" Said Jamila a bit skeptical.

"Yes, he showed me their seal."

"Maybe he had stolen it." Said Amir adding to his wife.

"Even if it wasn't him he didn't steal anything or attack us. So, if it was someone else then we just helped someone in need. And he was going in the direction of the mountain. The only thing that is up there is the palace."

"But you gave him your horse" I really didn't want to talk about it. But I explained it anyway.

"She gets nervous when she is far away from familiar surroundings for too long. If it weren't him and they capture her, she will probably break free and find home. Also, Saree' doesn't like to pull carriages, so she was the only option."

Isak joined into the conversation and to my irritation started talking about the dance invitation.

"He asked you for the first dance?" Asked my mother. This was now really getting on my nerves. I just wanted to relax and read a book in silence. But you can't always get what you want can you.

"Yes, but as I already told Isak he was probably just being polite."

"You do realize that that is the exact same thing I told you the first time Amir said I had beautiful eyes?" Said Jamila smirking.

" Yes, but you were in denial. And you both already had feelings for each other, to which you were both oblivious." Jamila raised an eyebrow. "You mean to say that you don't have any feelings towards him." "No, at least not the feelings you are talking about. Besides, I have known him now for five hours."

" Okay, but what if he was serious about the dance."

"Well I don't know about his dancing skills but if he is as clumsy as I am well both embarrass ourselves. Then we at least have something to laugh about." " I heard somewhere that he is a great dancer." Said Elias.

"oh, great, so I'll just embarrass myself then." I sighed.

"Your dancing really isn't as bad as you think Sana." Said Jamila.

At that moment a servant came into the room and announced that dinner was ready. We all took a seat in the dining room. It wasn't a very big room, as we had only rented the apartment for one night and didn't need that much. After supper I chose to return to my room, instead of joining my family in the living room, to finish the last things for the assignment, read, pray and go to bed as I was tired.

 

Yousef

It was around two o'clock in the afternoon when I decided to go see Saree'. Yesterday I had unsaddled her and put her in an empty stable with the rest of our horses. I packed my bag with the things I was going to need and went down the two flights of stairs to the hall. There I was met with my mother. I told her that I was going to leave a little earlier than planned and went outside through the big wooden doors. I walked on the cobblestones, over the grass to the right side of the court yard to our stables. The building had space for up to ten horses and we had eight in total. I stepped into the building and was met with the stable boy, Pasha, who was feeding the horses. Pasha and I were somewhat friends. At least I considered him as such. Pasha was somewhere in his thirties and besides caring for the horses he also cared for all the other animals around the castle. He lived in a small house nearby together with his wife and children.

"Good afternoon Pasha." I said. He looked up and smiled.

"Hey Yousef. Are you coming to get to get Saree' already? I thought you weren't leaving until three?" He asked frowning.

"Yes, but I wanted to leave a little earlier."

"Ah, I understand."

I walked to the stable I had put Saree' in the night before. I looked into her eyes and stroked her nose with my free hand, in my other hand still holding my bag.

"Did you groom her already?" I asked.

"Yes, I did. You can saddle her up immediately, I'll get her things for you."

I smiled gratefully at him. He then walked towards the small room that stored all saddles and bridles and such.

"Have you also fed her?" I asked Pasha.

"Yes, I have." He answered while walking towards me. "She has been a little agitated though. But perhaps a walk will do her good." Pasha said.

 

I put my bag on the floor and took all Saree's things from him. I hung them on the low wall of the stable. First, I grabbed a halter and rope and put them on her head. I then led het out of the stable and tied her to a post. Here I had a little bit mere room to put her saddle on and her bridle. I got her saddle pad and put it on her back. Then I put her saddle on and strapped all belts and buckles that were to be strapped. As last I untied her from the post and replaced the halter with the bridle, as it had reigns. I did all these things while petting her a lot. I brought the halter back where I had gotten it from, said goodbye to Pasha and mounted the horse.

The weather was nice out and I could hear birds singing from the trees. For the first half of my journey we spent in one-sided silence. I occasionally talked to Saree', remarking on the trees or other surroundings. And sometimes she breezed, but if that was in response to something that I had said or just because of flies I did not know. Yesterday evening I had talked even more but that was because I had been scared out of my mind, alone in the dark, with only a stranger's horse as companion.

When we had started our path Saree' had been a little tense, but now she was starting to loosen up and getting more comfortable. There was of course another reason why I gone to Atla earlier than the rest, other than the beautiful nature around me. About halfway on the road to Atla there was a very big field with a beautiful view of the mountains it was surrounded by. I stopped here. I got of the horse and pulled her into the field. A few months earlier the grass had still been short but now it was pretty tall. I walked over to a tree on the side of the field. I wasn't afraid that Saree' was going to run away suddenly as she was pretty calm. So, I let the reigns hang around her neck and let her graze as sat down against the tree.

I had come here quite often after what happened to my little brother. About twenty meters in front of me were the remains of a large tree. Only a bit of the stem was still there which was entirely scorched black. Just a few weeks ago, when the grass had been shorter, the tree had still been standing there proudly as a whole.

My little brother Nadim used to come here a lot. he would come here to be alone and to think, he always said that this was the only place where he could truly let his mind run free. He had had great plans for this field. He had once told me that when he was older he would build a big house here right next to the tree. And when he would marry he would live here with his family. He had even made plans for it. But those dreams had been cut short very quickly earlier this year. I really wasn't over it yet and as I remembered all of this, tears started welling up in my eyes and streaming down my face. It had been a stormy summer night, about two months ago.

We had all been inside the castle safe and sound when my mother told us she couldn't find Nadim anywhere. We all knew that he would be in the field and I was sent to fetch him. I had taken the horse I usually took when I went out riding alone, Meander, and rode to the field. As I had been galloping down the road rain had been slapping me in my face. Thunder had been getting closer and closer as I arrived at the field. I had found Nadim's horse standing alone and had quickly grabbed its reigns and tied them to my saddle. The rain had almost made it impossible for me to see and I yelled Nadim's name across the field. I had gotten an answer, but it came from far away. He had sounded terrified and when I looked closer I saw him standing on the other side of the field. He had had no other choice but to cross over the grass. He had started running as soon as he had seen me and just as he had been under the tree lightning struck it. There wasn't much of a fire but the branches fell down, landing right on top of Nadim knocking him unconscious. One flaming branch fell down next to him and caught onto his side. Luckily I had been by his side fast enough to extinguish the flames. I had shaken him a few times and called out his name, trying to get him to wake up. I had checked his pulse and let out a sigh of relief when I had heard a heartbeat. I had picked him up and hoisted him up my horse with me.

That had been how I came home, holding Nadim's horse on its reigns in one hand and holding my brother in my arms while still holding onto Meander. As I had entered the courtyard I had immediately been met with people. My mother and brother, Ismael, who had been on the lookout for us and had stormed outside when they saw the state we were in, in the pouring rain. My sisters had come running outside behind them. Ismael had carried Nadim to his room and Pasha had brought the two terrified horses to the stables. When Nadim had been all dried up we let the physician come. He had put something on the burns to sooth the wounds and had told us that he would most likely be awake tomorrow. If that were not the case we should call for him again. I had been exhausted at this point and had gone to bed with faith in the fact that Nadim would wake up the day after. But the next day and the day after he still hadn't woken up. The physician had told us that he was in some kind of coma. This had been early in the summer and school was still open, which meant I had had to teach. It had helped me a lot, talking about Islam, praying and putting my faith fully in Allah. I hadn't ever prayed as much in my life as I had in that period. Whenever I hadn't been in Atla I had been at Nadim's bedside. About three more days had gone by before Nadim woke up. And for a moment everything had been well. And then the fever came. Apparently, he had gotten some kind of infection, and because his health had been so down lately his body had had a hard time fighting it. During this time, I had tried very hard to stay positive, there was no way He would have let a thirteen-year old boy with so many hopes and dreams die, right? Well I had been wrong. He had grown weaker and paler every day. Through all this he had kept assuring us that he would make it. But he had been wrong too.

A few days later I had been woken up by Maya, my sister, franticly shaking me. When I had asked what was going on she had said that Nadim was dying and that I had to come to his room. I hadn't wasted a second and together we had run to our brother's room. We had all held him as he breathed with difficulty. He had told us that it was his time, to which I answered that that was ridiculous and that he had a whole life in front of him, if he would just hold on a little longer. He laughed but winced immediately "I can't" he had said whimpering pain. We had all been crying and sobbing, holding on to him tightly. He had told us that he loved us and that he would be waiting for us through his tears and we had told him the same. He had even joked that he would check if he saw baba there. This had followed by a lot of coughing. We had held him and patted his back. When he had laid down again he had been much paler. We had then all said good bye to him and him to us. And we had watched as he expressed one last smile, his eyes closed, his mouth hung open and he became entirely still. We had all sobbed even harder then, crying things like 'it should have been me' and 'why'. We hadn't left that room until we absolutely had to, we had had to eat. We had sat there at the dinner table barely being able to eat. In the days following his funeral I had first blamed myself. Then I had blamed God for taking away such a young life in such a devastating manner. I hadn't forgiven Him yet now as I was sitting against a tree with my knees up to my chest, my arms and head resting on top of them and crying my eyes out.

I felt something soft nudging against my head. I looked up and was met with the sight of a big nose. It was Saree'. She was probably checking what was wrong and I smiled at the gesture. I petted her over her head. In that moment I saw something very red poking its head out of the grass a few meters away from me. I turned my head. It was a red fox looking right at me, holding what looked like a stone in his mouth. It hopped towards me and laid the stone in front of me. The fox then ran away looking backwards at me and jumping like a dog wanting to play catch. So that is what I did. I picked up the stone and threw it as far as I could. The moment it landed the fox sprinted towards it and brought it back to me. I threw it again and again, each time the fox brought the stone back. I was starting to enjoy the game and beginning to smile again. I stood up so I could throw better. This way me and the fox played catch for quite a while. I had never played catch with a fox before, I didn't even know they liked that. Foxes were usually very shy towards humans and I didn't know why this fox decided it was a good idea to play catch with one, but I was glad it had. After a while I saw the fox getting tired and I had to admit that I was too.

When I was back on the road I was feeling a lot lighter than I had at the beginning. I arrived at the city castle at around four, which was in time with the rest of my family. Sana had told me to put Saree' in the stables here so that was what I did. I got my bag from the saddle, brushed her one last time and checked her hooves for any rocks so that I could give her back entirely clean.

I went into the castle and many people were already busy with the preparations. Flowers were being put into the right places, it was made sure everything was clean and the food was being brought into the kitchen to be prepared. I went up the stairs to my room. When I was finally alone in my room I sat on my bed. Another reason that we were having a ball at this castle was so we could replace the bad memories with good, new ones. I got my bag from the floor and put it on my bed. Then I unpacked my stuff and put it in the closet where they belonged. I changed my clothes into something more formal and went down the hall to my brother's room. I knocked on the door.

"Yes?" I heard Ismael vaguely through the door.

I opened it a little so that I could poke my head through.

"Are you almost ready? The guests are arriving in an hour."

"Yes, just a moment. And don't stand there hanging in the door way, just come in."

I went inside. He was sitting on his bed, tying his shoes. "So, do you already have an eye on someone?" I teased while taking a seat next to him. "A few." 

"Who?" I asked as I laid on his bed.

"Well there is Hannah, she's pretty. Then there is also Ayla and Farah."

I frowned " Hanna has a bad personality. Your best chances are Ayla or Farrah, unless you meet someone else and fall hopelessly in love off course." I said smirking. 

"Well, honestly I don't know how it is gonna go. I just hope for the best. Do you have someone in mind?" He asked narrowing his eyes at me. 

"I did meet someone yesterday. Her name was Sana, I told you about her. "

"The one who lent you her horse. That must mean something right?" 

"She was just being nice, I needed to get home somehow." 

"But she is pretty, going by the look on your face?" He asked. 

"Oh, yes. Absolutely. She said she was going to be here tonight. But that is all I know about her. She was nice but maybe she is actually really mean and was just being polite. She might not actually have meant to accept the invitation." I muttered that last part, but he still heard it. 

"What kind of invitation?"

"I asked her to dance the first dance."

He started laughing at that and I was a bit offended. "You are so bad at this. You meet a pretty girl and you immediately ask her to dance. You're not even trying to be subtle." Then he paused and frowned. "You said her name was Sana? Maybe it was Sana Bakkoush?"

"The chances of that are very slim, Sana is not an unpopular name." 

"Did she say that she would be at dinner?"

" No, she just said she would be here." 

"Well, we'll see then."He shrugged.

"I guess we will" 

I stood up and stretched. "I think it is time to go down stairs. What do you think?"

"Yes, let's go." He stood up and we went down stairs.

 

We stepped into the drawing room where my sisters and mother were playing a game of cards. They had also changed clothes and were wearing colorful dresses. " Can we join?" I asked standing by their table. " Yes, of course" we took place next to each other at the round table. We played for a while until a servant came by the door and announced that The Sætre family had arrived. We greeted them. My sisters and Noora Saetre immediately started talking and knowing them probably wouldn't stop until they fell asleep. 

After that Mikael's family arrived. We sat at a separate table and discussed the things that had happened in our lives since we had last seen each other. Mikael told a story about how he chased his cat around his house because it had gotten hold of his bottle of ink. Ink had been splashed everywhere and his mother had demanded that he cleaned it himself, instead of letting servants take care of it. He told it in a hilarious way and it was clear that although he had been about it then, he could laugh about it now.

About an hour later the Bakkoush family arrived. Everyone was curious about them, as no one had ever met them. I looked up and there was Sana.

When they stepped into the room I immediately recognised her. Ismael nudged me. "Is it her?" He asked. "Yes it is." I said with a smile growing on my face. She was even more beautiful than yesterday and I couldn't take my eyes of her. It looked like she was bickering with one of her brothers. We all stood up from the table to greet them. When she saw me I saw her eyes light up. 


	3. Let's dance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry for being so late to the ones who were looking forward to this. I don't want to spoil too much but, the plot gets introduced in this chapter. At least it gets introduced for a big part. There is more to it, but this will be reveled in later chapters. Have fun and tell me what you think in the comments!

When she saw me her eyes light up in recognition. I left Mikael to introduce himself to the rest of the family as I made a beeline for Sana. I was delighted to see her again and had since yesterday been very curious to who she was. I had, after arriving home and redressing my wounds, thought long about who she could have been. At dinner I had told everyone the story. They had immediately tried to guess who I had met. But after dinner they had seemed to forget about it. I instead had picked up the guest list and had looked for girls I hadn’t met yet. I had narrowed it down to twenty girls, which hadn’t been very helpful. Sana Bakkoush had of course been amongst those..  
"Sana Bakkoush, it is nice to meet you. Again." I said smiling at her. 

She smiled back. "It is nice to meet you again as well. And you are really Yousef Acar."

"You had doubted that?" I asked. I had shown her the family seal, there shouldn’t be that much doubt.

"Well you never really know, do you?" She said smiling.

"No you don't" I chuckled. She had a point. I probably wouldn’t have been entirely sure either if I had been in her position. 

“How are your feet doing?" She asked.

"Good, thank you for that again." I said, suddenly being very aware of my toes again. They did still hurt a little when I leaned in certain directions, but they were healing well.

"It was no problem really." Sana smiled. " How is Saree'?"

"She is fine. If you want I can show her to you later. She is in the stables." 

"Yes I would like that." 

Then someone interrupted. It was a man of around fifty years old with grey hair that was already fading. I assumed him to be Sana's father King Ahmed Bakkoush of Avendra. “I am glad to see you two get along so well, but you both have more people to greet." Her father said and my face heated up as I became aware the there were people looking at us. I quickly recovered and reached my hand out to him. 

"It is nice to meet you. I had met your daughter yesterday already. I assume she told you about that?" 

"Yes she did. You also saved her for the first dance I heard.” He said. There was an amused gleam in his eyes.

My face went red as I realized what that all implied. It was meant in a friendly way really. Yes, she was beautiful and smart and kind but I had no romantic intensions.

"Yes, I did. Is that alright?" I asked, to be sure. 

"Yes it is. It's a great way to get to know each other."

His wife then stood next to him and introduced herself together with her oldest son and her daughter in law. The last member of the Bakkoush family to introduce himself was Elias. He was a very cheerful and confident person, which I liked. 

"My sister told me you had already met. But I can assure you, I am a lot more fun than her."

I laughed at that and looked over where Sana was standing. She was now talking to my sisters and Noora, as I had predicted.

"How do you like it here? I heard you were here a day early." I asked.

"Sana had an assignment that took up the whole day. It luckily gave me time to explore the city." 

“What did you think?”

“I liked it. It inspired me a lot for my new book.” He replied. It surprised me. 

“You write?” I asked smiling.

“Yes, I do.” 

“Do you write fiction or non fiction?” 

“Both, it really depends on the mood.” He said smirking.

Mikael and Ismael had finished greeting everyone and had returned to the table. 

“Do you want to come sit with us?” I asked Elias. 

We walked towards the rest and took our seats. “So Elias, what do you do?” 

“I am a writer.”

“Ah, that’s amazing.” Said Mikael. “I tried to write once but it is so hard. And I admire people who do though.”

“What do you do then?” Asked Elias. 

“I study law, my father is a lawyer and I have always been interested in the subject.”

“Is it as interesting as you had hoped it would be?”

“Yes, definitely.” 

We all discussed what we did for work or what we were studying. I told about my job as a teacher but left out the fact that I was going to resign. About half an hour later Even’s family arrived, shortly followed by the Meaker family and the Mohn family. Eva and Nadia Mohn went, after greeting everyone, directly to the table where my sisters were sitting. Thea Meaker joined Linn as they were best friends. Aaron Meaker went directly to Eskild. The Meaker family was one of the richest families in Fellk, the country over which the Seatre family ruled. This was why the children were closer to the Seatre siblings than to us. We were all friends though, just not as well with one as the other. Cassandra Meaker had for a very long time been great friends with my mother, which was why they were invited to dinner at almost every festivity. Even joined our group enthusiastically after all the greetings were done. He introduced himself to Elias and we all started talking again. Elias had fit in so well in our group that it was as if he had always been there. He got along with everybody and was all-round very friendly. He luckily didn’t make it look like he was about to steal all my friends. It was more like he was a missing puzzle piece of a puzzle that was already mostly complete. He was a great guy and in no time he had integrated himself nice and comfortably in our friend group. 

Dinner was announced and everyone went to the dining room. The room was tall and 7 meters in width and 12 in length. On one side of the room there were giant windows. There were four of them. Directly on the other side where three big mirrors of about a meter long and wide starting at breast height. We all took our seats with our family and friends. My mother and brother were sitting at the heads of the table. The tables were long and light brown. The chairs were the same color and were covered with red. On the table were silver candle holders and strings of roses running over the length of the table like snakes. The napkins were folded into little birds and the silver was shining in the last light coming from the windows.

"So you met someone?" I asked Even, continuing the previous conversation.

His eyes lit up. " Yes. So at the bakery on Rosyn street this morning." He paused a moment to take a deep breath. He grinned.

"There was a boy of about eighteen in front of me in line. I assumed he was from another country as he was whispering his order over and over again. The moment it was his turn he had seemingly forgotten his entire vocabulary, gave up and then proceeded to order in Arabic in the hope the baker understood. Well he didn't. So after some stuttering I took pity on the boy and offered to help him out."

I was a bit alarmed since I knew how Even was. "Oh God, what did you do!" I cried.

He grinned.

"Nothing too bad, I just added very spicy local things to his order. I just advised him to buy it and he did."

I started laughing and he laughed along with me. His father got involved in the story as Even had come home rather cheerfully and told the entire story to them at the breakfast table. Something he didn't do often. 

As appetizer there was a white soup served. It was creamy and had just enough flavor to awaken the taste buds, but not enough to leave them satisfied. At the main course which was light as well, as we were supposed to dance for hours afterwards, Eskild and Linn were telling a lively story about their sisters engagement to William Magnusson and how much they were against it. Throughout the story I felt my eyes moving to Sana who was seated far from me on the other side of the table. I very much tried to focus on the conversation that was going on around me, but seeing Sana so comfortable and freely laughing was a nice sight and very distracting. When I was done with my plate I, for whatever reason, stared at her a bit too long and was promptly awakened by Even snapping his fingers in front of my face. "Don't stare, it isn't polite." Said Ismael and I looked around at everyone trying to keep their laugh in. I wanted the ground to swallow me whole.

Just before dessert the adhan went. The original plan had been to be done with desert as well before he went, but the main course had taken longer than expected. They also couldn’t wait as the guest could start arriving immediately after dinner. About half the table excused themselves to go and pray. It seemed that I had timed my arrival quite well, given this was the first time I had heard the call since I came here. Yesterday I had heard it as well. It had been on my way back from the florists when its loud calls started vibrating through the city. Normally it would have filled me with happiness, a sense of purpose and belonging. Now it just reminded me of my anger. I froze when the call started. I immediately felt the urge to join the rest leaving the table. But I didn’t, I couldn’t. as Ismael left the table he put a hand on my shoulder as if to tell me he understood. When almost all the people had left I looked around at the empty seats. I then decided to stand up as well. I couldn’t bring myself to go and pray so I walked to the drawing room. Once the call ended and everyone had left I could relax a little more. I waited behind the thresh hold of the drawing room to the dining room. I looked around the empty room where we all had been sitting, socializing, an hour ago. I had almost completely forgotten the pain that would come with hearing the adaan again. 

A while later people started coming back to the dining room, so I went back as well. They all looked lighter and happier. It reminded me of the time where I would come back from prayer feeling like that. I so badly wanted that feeling back. I just didn’t know how I could achieve that without doing something I didn’t want to do. It was silent for a moment between me and Even as I retook my seat. I looked at my plate but knew Even was looking at me with a concerned look on his face. 

“Are you okay?” he asked.

I just nodded, picked up the glass of water in front of me and took a sip.

“You haven’t told anyone else yet?” Even asked.

I put my glass back down and shook my head. “No.” I whispered.

He understood and was patient. He had been patient with me this whole summer, with all the decisions I had made since then. Just as I had been patient with him in his difficult periods in life. After the last one, his attempted suicide, for which he still hadn’t told me the reason for, we hadn’t talked for a week. After that week I had realized that he needed me as much as I needed him. No one except Even, Mikael and my own family knew that I had stepped away from my faith. Luckily they had all been patient and accepting of my decision. My family saw it as a period in my life in which I just wasn’t sure anymore, which they completely understood was because of Nadim’s death. It was as if I had put all my faith in god in that short period of time and I had let my faith depend on the outcome. As a result I was let down so much that all my faith was gone. It was as if I had placed a bet and lost, losing everything along with it. I had to slowly earn it back.

The first few weeks after my decision had been very hard. For a while I had avoided going to Atla all together, in fear of hearing the adaan and my anger growing, making me do something stupid. I had gotten over that now. Now I just avoided the mosque. The problem was that the school was in the mosque. School was starting again in two weeks and I had to make a decision concerning my resignation quickly.

After desert we all went to the ballroom. In about fifteen minutes people started stream in and the ball started. More than five hundred people were on the guest list. Among those five hundred was the Magnusson family. They were a pretty powerful family.

I was standing in a group with my friends when it was announced that the first dance was going to start. The musicians got ready and we started looking for dance partners. I of course already had a dance partner and searched the crowd for Sana.

I found her standing with my sisters and their friends. At dinner Noora had probably told Sana the story of her engagement, or at least a part of it. This would explain why now, in the ballroom with groups of guests arriving one by one, Sana and the other girls were glaring at them. Once William saw Noora he strode towards her. Eva grabbed Noora’s wrist as some form of comfort and they all put up a perfect smile as he came closer. He introduced himself to Sana and they all engaged in some small talk. At some point he looked backwards towards his family and gestured towards his cousin, who then walked towards the group of girls. I knew this cousin to be quite egocentric and arrogant. I really didn’t like him personally. 

I saw Sana frowning at something Karl must have said and I took it as my cue to make my way to them. She looked in my direction quickly then looked apologetically at William and his cousin.  
Just as I reached them I heard the end of Sana saying “you just have the find the right partner.” before blindly reaching out her hand towards me. I decided not to say anything and took her hand, twirled her once and pulled her towards the rest of the couples on the dance floor. 

As we left the rest of the group had looked quite astonished. And I was sure she had said something brilliant. I hadn’t wanted to spoil the moment and therefore kept silent. Once we were in the middle of the dancefloor I finally asked her what she had said. She was grinned brightly. “William Magnusson had, rather rudely, suggested his cousin as a dance partner for me. I declined.” She shrugged. 

“What did he say?” I asked as the dance started.

“the usual stupid comments, mixed in with some of the greatest sexism and misogyny one can find in this continent.”

I hummed apologetically in response and frowned.

” I am sorry, they tend to do that. But I can assure you that they are one of the few families that do that.” 

She smiled. “Yes I found that out too, which was quite nice.”

She looked in the distance behind me for a moment and then frowned. “I wonder why she chose him, she clearly doesn’t like him.” 

”She didn’t choose him, it was arranged.”

She looked up surprised. “Seriously.” 

She then grimaced looking over my shoulder again. “That explains a lot. And it is probably not going to work out, she looks so uncomfortable with him.”

I looked in their direction as we turned. Noora looked indeed like she very much wanted to leave. 

” I do feel sorry for her. Certainly because it wasn’t done for the usual purpose of connection.”

“It wasn’t?”

“no, didn’t she tell you?”

”I don’t think she had the chance, her mother was sitting right next to her.”

“It is used to spy on the Magnusson family. They are rumored to be after the King’s Treasure.”

Her smile faded and she frowned. “But the kings treasure doesn’t exist, it’s just a story. And even if it did exist, its insanely dangerous to go look for it.” 

“Yes, but Henry doesn’t want to risk it. And in the wrong hands the treasure could be a danger to us all. Not that the Seatre family would be considered the good hands, but its better than the Magnussons.”

“If you despise the Magnusson family so much, why do you associate with them?”

“The family is way to influential and imported in our export and import. We can’t afford not inviting them.”

“I understand.” She looked around.

From the corner of my eye I saw someone weirdly approach us, then rethinking and switch dance partner with someone else. 

“I think we were supposed to change partner.” Said Sana chuckling, having probably seen the same thing as I had.

I let out a laugh. “yeah it seems so.”

“It’s a bit too late to do that now. but I am content with dancing with just you for now, what do you think.”

I was fine with it, she was a pretty good dancer and I felt at peace and happy being around her. I didn’t know why but I just did. So I agreed and we continued our earlier conversation. 

 

Sana.

When I had first seen him again this afternoon I had recognized him immediately. I noticed how handsome he actually was. I decided to ignore those feelings and focused on the other people i had to meet. Meeting Maya, Ayaan, Nadia, Noora and Eva was very nice. I was surprised at their friendly ness and how much we had in common. I usually had very different interests than other girls, which most of the time resulted in them not wanting to be friends with me and me not wanting to be friends with them. Except Chris back home of course, she was one of my best friends. I had been quite anxious that I wouldn't find anyone to talk to tonight and I was almost sure of it would happen, but I had been wrong. Which I would never admit to anyone, ever. At dinner among many stories was mentioned that Noora was engaged to William Magnusson. I had heard of that family before, bit only in mentioning, so I didn't really know how they were. But it had been clear at the dinner table that Noora and the other girls were not happy about the engagement. They hadn't been able to say more as Noora's parents had been sitting next to her. But when he appeared in the ballroom I had seen her tense up, and after a few rude comments of him about dance partners and such I had very much wanted to leave. In the corner of my eye I had seen Yousef approaching me and I took my chance. I had very smoothly removed myself from the situation and I was quite proud of it. 

Now as we danced and talked I felt at peace. I didn't know what it was, if it was the dancing itself or the partner. Or even the music, or the conversation, or the grotesque ballroom that made me feel so free. It was hard to keep looking into Yousef's eyes as I was supposed to, as he was smiling a lot. He also had a ridiculous face which I couldn't look at while also keeping my face neutral. It was quite frustrating. The conversation went from Noora and the treasure to family, friends and occupation. I discovered that he was a teacher, which I admired even though I had nothing with children myself. I told him about my studies and my wish to go from studying biology to medicine. 

The dance slowly came to an end.

"That was very nice" I said. 

"Yes it was." He replied smiling. He then looked at something behind me and then looked into my eyes again.

"I think my friends want me back. I can show you where Saree' is later, if you like?" 

"Yes I would like that." 

I looked back and saw Ayaan beckoning me to come back to them.

" I think they want me back as well. But it was fun, I'll see you later."

"Yes, I'll see you." 

He made a slight bow and I curtsied and walked back to my newfound friends. Arriving at the group they were already failing to keep their grins in. I frowned feigning confusion, I knew exactly why they were looking at me like that.

"What?" I asked the group of giggling girls. 

"Did you have fun with my brother." Said Maya. 

"Yes, I did." I said as indifferently and matter of factly as I could. 

"And you were so enraptured by him you didn't notice you were supposed to switch partners."

” I wasn't enraptured, we were having a good conversation. We just hadn't noticed we were supposed to change partner."

"Five times?" Ayaan asked skeptically.

"Yes." I replied not too sure of my answer.

They all hummed. 

"Well at least you had more fun than I had." Said Noora. I felt very bad for her now that I knew the whole situation.

I smiled sadly. “Well you danced with more people than only him at least.”

“Yes, I also danced with Eva. Which was fun.” She said looking at Eva. “But I also danced with Williams cousin. A thing which you had saved yourself quite graciously from I must admit.” I smiled at that last part. But we all grimaced as a reflex when she said she had danced with Karl. I and probably the rest of the girls too had not been very charmed by him to say the least. 

“I’m sorry” Maya said putting a hand on Noora’s shoulder. 

“I danced with him too said Ayaan. And honestly I am happy my brother and you are so weirdly in sync . I wouldn’t wish that upon anyone.”

“Was it really that bad?” Asked Eva.

“Worse. He hadn’t even said two sentences and I already wanted to leave.”

“Let’s just try and stay away from the Magnusson family for the rest of the evening all right?” Suggested Nadia and we all agreed.

 

Some hours and dances later me and the girls were together again on the sidelines of the ballroom. We were talking about hobbies and things that had happened in our lives. The whole time from the moment Yousef had mentioned the treasure I had been looking for a way to go to Saree’ without it being weird. It was getting pretty late and I was getting more and more tired as well. I used this as a way to excuse myself from the group. I wished the girls goodnight and we all promised to write to each other. 

I searched the crowd to find Yousef. I did, he was talking to Elias and a tall blond man I assumed was Even. I tried to cross the room to the table with drinks where Elias stood. It was quite difficult to reach them as I had to almost wrestle myself through the crowd. Finally I arrived where I wanted to be. 

“You must be Even.” I said to the tall blond. 

“Yes. Nice to meet you. You’re Sana Bakkoush right?” He answered cheerfully.

“Yes. It’s nice to meet you too.” I said smiling. I then turned towards Yousef.

“Yousef, I was wondering if you could show me where Saree' is. It is getting quite late, and I want to go to bed. But not before I have seen her. ” I asked.

“Off course.” He answered. 

We walked out of the ballroom. 

As we walked through the hall Yousef asked “If you are really so tired, you can see her tomorrow right?”

“Yes I know, but Saree’ gets really stressed when she doesn’t see anything familiar for a long time.”

I chuckled as I remembered something. “There was this one time where I was at a friend of mine and I had taken Saree’ with me. I had left her there at the stables and was so busy I had not visited her in the afternoon and thus hadn’t checked on her for more than a day. I knew the stable boy would brush and feed her, so I wasn’t worried. The night after I heard a door open and a lot of other loud noise. I dismissed it. But the following morning I came downstairs to find Saree’ pacing back and forth in the hallway. I had just gotten her then.” He laughed.

We arrived at the stables and I went directly to Saree’. She was clearly happy to see me as she pushed her nose against my hand and breezed. I stroked her head and smiled. I had missed her and had yesterday actually looked forward to being able to ride with her and explore the area together this morning. But those plans had just moved on to tomorrow, so nothing was lost. I went into the stable and glided my hand over her back. I admired how my hand made extra shades on her back and made it look like there were multiple kinds of silver. Her mane were long and dark and I always brushed them out as best as I could, so that they would shine just as much as the rest of her body. She was anxious and nervous a lot, but I loved her and wouldn’t change her for the world. 

“How long have you had her?” asked Yousef.

“About four years.” 

He frowned. “But if she is so anxious, why did you take her with you?”

“She is my favorite. She's very sensitive to emotion. Which I like. Sometimes when I talk to her it's almost like she talks back.” I replied smiling. 

He smiled as well, remembering something. “I noticed. When I rode her here this morning I did a lot of thinking, and she reacted quite well to it.”

His face suddenly grew darker, as if in deep thought. But whatever he was thinking about was none of my business so I didn’t ask. After some conversation Yousef was called away, probably by Even who was wondering what was keeping him so long.

The moment he left the grand, slightly cold stable a lot of things started happening. As if on cue I smelled the sweet scent of roses and lavender. I heard a giggle. I panicked. I quickly turned and sprinted towards Saree’s saddle on the stable wall. I took the key from the chain around my neck and quickly opened the small secret compartment in the back of the saddle. I got the diamond out and put in a pocket I had sown into my dress. I wanted to run out but I was already too late. I turned around and in front of me floated a slightly blueish creature mid air. She was flapping her wings slowly to stay in place.. She looked mostly human, apart from the light blue shade of her skin, wings, pointy ears and almost fluorescent green eyes sparkling with mischief. She was about half my size and very pretty, as most elves are. Once I could see her she waited about one second before attacking. I evaded her and ran to the other side of the stables. Her giggling continued al through her attacks. I kept running around the stables, trying to find something to get her out. The horses had woken up by now from the noise and were making little destressed sounds while shuffling their feet.

Elves, when encountered in a normal situation are very nice and sweet creatures. They are known for being compassionate and kind to everyone, stranger or friend. Elves are not so pleasant when they have decided to declare war on you.

It had started last year, just after we had driven the goblin of the castle and my uncles mind. The day after that event the king of the elves came to me accusing me of killing the creature. I and everyone who knew me, even a little bit, knew that I would never do that. Yes I fought for justice for and against anyone, no matter who they were. People didn’t always agree with my methods but I never hurt anyone physically and murder was absolutely against everything I believed in. I had protested the claims immediately off course, but the king had been sure I had done it. He had said that he had seen it with his own eyes and had then found the goblin dead and mutilated in the forest. He there and then, besides declaring war on me, had wanted the diamond back which he had given to me himself. The fact that he had declared war so quickly and hadn’t asked any questions was very strange. This and the fact that his eyes had had a green hue had been the reason I had refused to give the diamond back. Normally elf eyes were bright yellow. Only when enchanted by something powerful their eyes turned green. I had always known that many powerful families were looking for the diamond. Its legend was that it granted happiness and good fortune in the right hands. Those families saw themselves off course as the right hands. I was sure that one of them had enchanted the elf king. He had left peacefully. But as the months went by the accusations had gotten stranger and the elves had gotten more aggressive.

Suddenly a second elf appeared in the stable and started attacking me. At the far end of the building I noticed a pot of salt. I ran to it with the elves on my heels. I opened it as quickly as I could, took a hand full out of it and threw it at the creatures. They disappeared into nothingness and took with them the smell of blooming flowers. I then heard multiple footsteps coming towards the building. I quickly returned to the stable with Saree in it. Yousef, Elias, Mikael and Even walked into the stables. I must have looked a little disheveled as everyone frowned and Yousef asked if I was alright.

“Yes, I just tripped.” I looked at Elias who silently ran his fingers from his forehead to behind his ear indicating that a strand of hair had gotten loose from my hijab. I quickly put it back in place. “well I am going to bed now “ I said solemnly. 

“I’ll walk her” said Elias. 

He really didn’t need to do that, but I did have to tell him about the attack of the elves and apparently he had to tell me something as well. I said goodbye to the rest of the boys and me and Elias walked to the castle and towards our rooms. As we walked the long hallway he started talking. 

“Were it the elves?” He asked 

“Yes, there were two of them. How did you know?”

”just as you were gone I was going to get some of my finished writing for Even to read. When I came to my room there was an elf looking through all of my things. I don’t know if he took anything, but they were clearly looking for the diamond. You need to be careful.” Elias explained.

”I am.” I answered as we climbed the stairs to the first level. ”Oh and I discovered something. While dancing with Yousef we were talking about Noora’s engagement to William. Which is arranged by the way.” 

Elias paused and stood still for a moment. “Seriously?”

“Yes” I answered quickly wanting to continue my story. “Yousef also told me that the Magnusson family is allegedly very close to the treasure.”

I reached the second door on the left on the first level which had been assigned as my room. Elias’s room was right next to it and my parent’s opposite mine. We walked into my room and I took the pins out of my hijab as soon as the door closed. 

“But is the Magnusson family a wizard family or something like that then?” 

They must be” I answered as I wrapped the smooth fabric from around my head and folded it over a chair. “Otherwise they can't be so close. Do you know if they are still downstairs?”

I pulled of my shoes and released my toes from their confinement. I sat on my bed cross legged and pulled out my bun letting my long dark hair flow around my shoulders. 

“I do think so, but I'll take an extra look. Goodnight and be careful.” I smiled and wished him goodnight as well. When he left I prayed, dressed put the diamond under my pillow. Then I went to bed and dreamt about beautiful creatures and big ballrooms.

Elias.  
I walked back from Sana's room, down the flight of stairs through the hall to the ballroom. The encounter with the elf I had had an hour ago had been quite scary. The fact that Sana had been attacked too had made me paranoid. I knew that she could handle herself, that was why I had left her alone, but I was still slightly afraid. It was so important that the diamond remained in the right hands. Once arriving in the ballroom my eyes immediately found the Magnusson family. I had met them, and didn’t like them. But I was glad we now had a suspect at least. I then looked for Yousef and Even. They were at the table with the food. I walked up to them and they all smiled when they saw me. I was glad I had made friends so fast, not that that had ever been a problem. 

“Hey Elias, is Sana okay?” asked Even.

“She’s fine.” I answered. They all just nodded. I joined into the conversation, something about art, but I couldn’t really focus on it, since I kept looking around checking if there were any elves. The conversation was about paintings, which I knew next to nothing about anyway. After sometime I got more comfortable. I looked around and saw the high balcony that lined the walls.

“Hey Yousef, can we get up there.” I said, keeping my eyes on the balcony. 

“Sure.” He replied smiling and I looked at him. He lead the way to a door on the side of the room that I hadn’t noticed before. We all went in and climbed the narrow steps to the balcony. Once on the balcony I was struck with wonder. Two sides of the room had been lined with mirrors and on the ground it had already been pretty. But from the height we were at it looked absolutely wonderful. It was like that people went on forever in those mirrors. We looked at the people dancing. They were so in time I with each other it was hypnotizing. 

“Hey Yousef, you danced only one dance.” Mikael said. Apparently this was unusual, what other reason would there be for him to remark on it.

“And that is strange why?” Yousef asked. 

“Well, you never dance less than three dances. And we all danced mare than one, even Elias who no one knew yet.” 

I saw Yousef’s face grow sadder for a split second. Something was bothering him but he clearly didn’t want to talk about it. I had always had the weird gift of being able to read people. 

“That is because I am just that good looking.” I joked to get the attention off of Yousef. He looked at me with a grateful expression and I answered it with a smile.

“But what is it?” Said Even redirecting the attention back to Yousef.

Instead of Yousef replying, Mikael suggested. “Maybe instead of Ismael Yousef made a decision?”

Oh god no. We were not going down this route.

“No, I didn't. We are friends.” Yousef protested before dramatically adding. “I thought you were my friends.” Everyone huffed and just chuckled in response. Even put an arm around Yousef’s shoulders. 

“That is why we are here, to tease you. Besides there has to be a reason why you only dance one dance, the dance in which you switch partners multiple times, and dance it with only one person. That person being Elias sister of all people, someone you met only yesterday” I grimaced.

This conversation really needed to stop. It wasn’t that I didn’t support Sana's love life, I did. It also wasn’t because I didn’t like Yousef, because I liked him. I thought Yousef was a great guy, one that might even prove himself one of the best in the future. But this didn’t mean I wanted to hear anything about what was going on between him and my sister. 

Yousef looked quite tortured so I took pity on both him and myself.

“Guys can we move on to another subject. It’s still my sister we are talking about.” 

“Good idea.” Said Yousef, quite relieved.

The conversation changed and we stayed up there for about an hour. When the people started to leave, at around one o’clock, Mikael and Even left as well. We promised to write each other. Me and Yousef stayed talking for a while about many different things. Later when I was laying peacefully in my bed I thought about the events of the day. In spite of the attacks of the elves I was happy I had made such good friends in such a short period of time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tell me what you think!

**Author's Note:**

> Glossary (Things will be added as the story progresses.):
> 
> -Sibyan school (Sibyan Mektepleri): Primary school in the early ottoman empire. 
> 
>  
> 
> Please tell me what you think in the comments!


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